The Eagles and Charles M. Young: Behind the Cover Story

Can you tell me how the Eagles vs. Rolling Stone softball game came about? The band was angry at us for calling them sissies in Random Notes?
I forget where I got the item, but the Eagles had played some radios station at softball and they lost. I ridiculed them. And a few days after that, I got a letter from Henley insulting me and then I insulted him back in the column. And Henley for his whole life has been an inveterate writer of letters. If someone displeases him, he can send out these little masterpieces of venom. Glenn Frey is equally smart which is to say very smart. I hadn't been looking to start a feud with the Eagles. I was just looking to write a funny Random Note. And then they responded with this letter going after me and then I went back after them in the column and they were kind of the biggest band of the world and we were fighting over softball. We made this bet. I was amazed. I thought that we would just go out in Central Park and find an open spot in the Sheep's Meadow and play a softball game or something. And then we ended up flying to Dedeaux Field at UCLA. In retrospect, it was a much better place to play. The stands were full and they broadcast the game on the radio and there were rock stars who hated Rolling Stone because we'd said something nasty about them in the record review section there rooting for he Eagles. I felt like I was walking into the Roman Coliseum or something and was about to be eaten by lions. The Eagles were the top of California aristocracy at the time. Governor Jerry Brown was there and the Eagles had done benefits for him.

I remember the game went much faster than I thought it would. A seven-inning softball game doesn't take that long to play. You know, one of the things in Random Notes was Henley said something to the effect of, "Remember Charlie, I'm pitching and I don't like you." Like he was going to take my head off in slo- pitch softball. [Laughs] The Eagles won. I thought they were very gracious as winners. They sent me an autographed softball, and mine got stolen. The one time in my life I've been burgled, that's the one thing of value that they took.